One year ago, President Trump declared the Digital Equity Act “unconstitutional” and “racist and illegal” in a post on Truth Social. The next day, the Department of Commerce sent cancellation letters to every grantee.
Trump’s claim is false. The Digital Equity Act is a bipartisan law passed as part of the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act of 2021. It funds digital literacy training, device access, and technical support for rural communities, veterans, seniors, incarcerated people, people with disabilities, and communities of color. The president does not get to repeal a law by posting about it.
The National Digital Inclusion Alliance is suing to stop the illegal cancellation. UCC Media Justice is supporting that effort by coordinating an amicus brief written by the Samuelson Law, Technology & Public Policy Clinic at UC Berkeley School of Law, joined by 22 total organizations.
Here’s what the brief argues:
Deployment is not enough. The federal government has spent billions building broadband infrastructure. But building the road doesn’t help if people can’t drive.
As Senator Patty Murray, one of the Digital Equity Act’s sponsors, put it: investment in broadband infrastructure “isn’t much help if people don’t have the tools and skills to actually use their broadband connection.” The BEAD program funds infrastructure. The Act funds the organizations that help people use it. Canceling the DEA severs the connection between the two.
Trusted community organizations were left behind. The Digital Equity Act built a network of organizations already embedded in their communities, groups people actually trust and turn to for help. These organizations spent months forming partnerships and designing projects because NTIA told them collaboration would be prioritized. Those efforts are now wasted.
Real people lose real things. The brief documents specific projects that were designed, staffed, and ready to launch. Here is what cancellation actually costs:
- Communication Service for the Deaf planned to serve 20,000 Deaf, Hard of Hearing, and DeafBlind individuals nationwide, providing device access and digital literacy training in American Sign Language. CSD has done this work before through a successful federally funded program called Project Endeavor. They know how to reach this community. Now they can’t.
- Ameelio, a nonprofit that provides free communications to incarcerated people, partnered with the Idaho and Utah Departments of Corrections on network upgrades, device access, digital skills training, and job placement. There is a direct link between broadband adoption and reducing recidivism. Two state corrections departments signed on. That work is now stalled.
- The Land of Sky Regional Council in western North Carolina was recommended for a $7.7 million grant to serve 18 counties, including a mobile computer lab and digital health portal training for veterans.
- The National Digital Equity Center planned to place a digital navigator in all 16 counties in Maine for telehealth training with rural seniors.
Congress authorized these projects. NTIA reviewed and recommended them. Community organizations committed their own resources. The administration killed them with a social media post.
Not only are we working in court, but we’re also advocating in Congress. The Trump Administration also zeroed out the Digital Equity Act appropriation in its proposed budget. If appropriators go along with that, even a legal victory in court could be hollow. Congress needs to keep the money in the budget, and we are working with our allies to make sure they do that.
This is exactly the kind of fight UCC Media Justice was built for. In 1959, our founders went into the Jim Crow South to monitor television stations. That work led to the first-ever revocation of a broadcast license and established the legal right of citizens to participate in FCC proceedings. We are still using those tools.
When veterans in rural Appalachia can’t use a telehealth portal, when Deaf Americans can’t get training in their own language, when incarcerated people can’t access job programs that would keep them from coming back to prison, those are policy failures. The Digital Equity Act was Congress’s answer. The administration had no legal authority to cancel it.
You can read the full brief here:
NDIA v Trump Amicus Applicants and Supporters Amicus Brief AS FILED
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